The Island of Intrigue/Chapter 8
CHAPTER VIII.
Fate.
WILL you let go my arm, please," I said quietly. I was so angry that I began to tremble, and I was afraid to speak again, or fear I should say too much.
His face had been distorted with a perfectly fiendish look of rage, but at the sound of my voice he came to himself and stepped back with a sickly smile.
"Mademoiselle!" he stammered. "A thousand pardons! I was beside myself with anxiety for you!"
"Why?" I asked coldly. "Is there anything on Sunset Island to fear?"
He flashed a quick look at me before he replied:
"But the storm, Miss Waring! It is not safe in the forest, trees may fall"
I walked on without deigning to reply. Voices called to us from the veranda, and he shouted reassuringly in response. They were all awaiting us, and Aunt Julie swept me into her arms.
"Oh, my dear!" she cried. "I have been so anxious for you! Where on earth were you? You must promise me not to stray away by yourself again."
"I am sorry if I have caused you any worry," I replied. "I was sitting by the spring in the woods when I noticed how dark it was growing, and I hurried home as fast as I could."
It was the literal truth, but I felt my face grow warm, nevertheless, beneath her solicitous eyes.
"I have told Miss Waring but just now of the danger of falling trees, in the storm," Monsieur Pelissier volunteered.
Aunt Julie shuddered.
"Oh, I had such a fright last summer, Maida. Lorna was out in just such a storm like this and a great oak fell within a foot of her! I shall never forget it!—But you're soaking wet, child. Run quickly and change, and I'll send Lucie to you with some nice hot tea."
I didn't want any more tea, and I didn't feel like going down stairs again, either, and having that hateful Monsieur Pelissier near me. I could not understand how he had dared to speak as he had to me,—or why, for that matter.
I did not go down until dinner time, and during the meal I never once glanced at Monsieur Pelissier. He led the conversation adroitly, and made endless endeavors to draw me into it, but I made no response, and even his effrontery was not equal to tempting a direct snub by addressing me personally.
Later, in the drawing room, to my great relief, Mr, Fordyce came to me, and we had a long talk about Daddy. He did not discuss the business side of their association, of course, but spoke feelingly of their warm friendship of so many years standing. He had a keen, direct way of regarding one, which made me feel that he could see straight into my brain and know my thoughts before I uttered them. It would have made me uncomfortable, I think, but for his kind, fatherly manner, and the knowledge that he was really a friend.
The storm increased in violence during the night. The rain drove in sheets against my windows and the house, solidly built as it was, fairly shook in the great blasts of the wind. Once, as I lay listening to the roar of the tempest, I heard the dull booming crash which told of a falling tree, and I thought of Aunt Julie's fears for me, and Monsieur Pelissier's inexplicable rage. I was glad of the encounter for one reason; it gave me the best of excuses for avoiding him deliberately and openly in the future, and I meant fully to avail myself of it.
The morning dawned clear and bright, although the wind was still high, and the sea was covered with rolling crests of foam.
Mr. Fordyce left early.
"Goodbye, little Miss Princess!" he said, as he held my hand on the veranda steps. "I am glad that I have had this opportunity of knowing you, and hope I shall see much of you in the future. You have our friend's dearest possession in your keeping, Mrs. Smith," he added, turning to Aunt Julie, "take good care of her."
"I mean to!" she laughed, slipping her arm about my waist, "She has become very precious to all of us, too!"
To my surprise Monsieur Pelissier took Mr. Fordyce to the mainland in the launch alone, Alaric remaining with us on the veranda.
We watched the launch until it rounded the wooded curve at the end of the island. It pitched and tossed perilously on the choppy sea, and they all seemed apprehensive, Lorna particularly so. She said very little, but moved about restlessly, in such obvious perturbation, that Aunt Julie exclaimed finally:
"Heavens and earth! Lorna, do sit down and keep still! You get on my nerves mooning around like that. There's nothing to worry about; Raoul can handle that boat as well as Alaric."
Lorna replied with a hard, hysterical little laugh.
"Nevertheless, Alaric didn't go with them!" she returned. "If anything happens"
"Nothing can happen! Don't be a fool, Lorna!" Aunt Julie spoke more sharply than I had ever heard her. "Mr. Fordyce would not have attempted to go had there been any danger."
Lorna shrugged, and did not make any response. She presently wandered down the steps and disappeared on the path leading to the boat-house.
"What do you think of him, Maida; of Mr. Fordyce, I mean?" asked Aunt Julie.
"Oh, he's splendid!" I replied earnestly. "I'm so glad he's Daddy's friend. You feel as if you could trust him, absolutely, from the very first time he looks at you!"
"Yes, he does impress one that way," she returned, thoughtfully. "I have never had a moment's regret that I put my affairs into his hands."
"He's a clever old bird, I'll say that for him," Alaric remarked, with a grin. "I guess he knows his game pretty well, and he certainly plays it to the limit."
"Alaric, how can you talk so!" his mother exclaimed. "I should like to know just where we would all be, if he hadn't managed our affairs so nicely!"
So there had been a crisis, then, in their financial operations. Aunt Julie's anxiety before his coming must have been well founded, but evidently the matter, whatever it was, had been satisfactorily arranged. "I think he is a very nice old gentleman," observed Bijou, patronizingly. "In fact, I believe, Maida, that mother has had a matrimonial eye on him for some time."
"Bijou!" Aunt Julie's tone was scandalized. "What an idea! I don't think anyone would care to undertake being a stepfather to you children!—Isn't it nearly time for Raoul to return?"
"Yes, if he started back at once," Alaric replied. "I don't see any signs of the launch, though. I wonder what's keeping him?"
An hour passed and still he did not come. Then another, and no one made any attempt to conceal the anxiety the delay had caused. The wind had died down, and the sea was much calmer, so I knew there must be some cause for their apprehension other than the safety of the launch, but it was not discussed. Lorna reappeared, and passed on quickly into the house without a word to us, but one glance at her white, strained face showed me at last, beyond a doubt, that it was she and not Bijou, whose happiness was at stake, and I was genuinely sorry for her.
I picked up a book and tried to read, but the tension which held the others communicated itself to me, and I could not fix my mind on the story. There was some mystery on foot, and although it obviously did not concern me, I could not keep my thoughts from it. What could it be which was hanging over them all?
Finally a relieved shout from Alaric told us that the launch was coming at last. He leaped the veranda railing and ran toward the boat-house, and at the sound of his voice Lorna appeared in the doorway. She had been crying, but she didn't seem to care whether we noticed it or not.
In a few minutes, which seemed interminable, we saw Alaric and Monsieur Pelissier approaching. The Frenchman was talking rapidly, in a low voice which was indistinguishable to us, but his gesticulations betrayed his excitement.
"Alaric tells me that you all have been anxious," he began quickly, as he mounted the steps. "I am so sorry. Monsieur Fordyce got off safely, but just as I started to return the engine broke down, and I drifted for more than an hour before I could locate the trouble, and repair it. I am desolate that you were disturbed on my account."
He spoke generally, but his eyes rested for a fraction of a second on Lorna's. Then he turned to Aunt Julie.
"I have something to tell you," he said, very slowly. "A message from Monsieur Fordyce, which he only remembered at the last moment."
They passed hastily into the house together and were closeted somewhere by themselves until lunch time. Aunt Julie's face was grave and troubled again, when she took her place at the table, and she scarcely made a pretense of eating. It was a most uncomfortable meal, and I was glad when it was over. The atmosphere of the house oppressed me, so I took my writing tablet and a book, and started for the beach.
Monsieur Pelissier had the effrontery to advance toward me when I appeared on the lawn, but I turned my back squarely upon him and addressed Aunt Julie.
"I'm going to write some letters, and read," I said, with cold distinctness. "I will be back at tea time."
She nodded, with an absent smile, and I continued on my way. On every side there were traces of the havoc wrought by the previous night's storm. Great branches had been torn from the trees, saplings uprooted and tall bushes beaten flat in the path of the wind. I wondered if that young man had reached the bungalow safely, and if he had got very wet. Of course it made no difference to me, but I had learned from Daddy how helpless men were about such things, and he had no one to take care of him, and to do things for him, all alone up here as he was.
I had made up my mind that unless I stayed with the others all the time, which was unthinkable, I couldn't well avoid him, but I need not stop and talk; I couldn't greet him in a pleasant, friendly way, and go on.
Quite without thinking, I took the same path which I had followed two days before, and I emerged from the woods upon the beach not far from where Laddie had unearthed the landcrab. I seated myself on the sand, with my back against a convenient rock.
I didn't feel like writing just then, so I opened my book. It wasn't very interesting, however, and after a while I began to feel a little lonely. There wasn't a sound but the dull rolling of the surf, and a deep blue haze hung over the mainland, making it look very dim and far away. I picked up a handful of the shining, warm sand, and watched it sift through my fingers idly. I wished that I had something really absorbing to do. I wondered if I could write a book; not about big game hunting, of course, but something else. Love, maybe—only all the stories were about that, and it was so stupid
A shadow fell across the sand at my feet, and I looked up. I didn't need Laddie's joyously welcoming bark to tell me who was approaching.
"Good afternoon," said my host of the day before, as he dropped down on the sand beside me and held out his hand. "I hope you reached home before the rain started yesterday?"
"Not quite," I replied, "but I'm not the worse for it. You and Laddie must have been drenched."
"Oh, we ran for it!" he laughed. "We liked the rain didn't we, old man?"
"You are not working today?" I glanced at his empty hands.
"No, the storm seemed to electrify the atmosphere so that I couldn't settle down to browsing over a lot of old notes.—You're not going?"
I had picked up my belongings.
"I must," I said firmly, adding with hasty mendacity. "I promised Alaric a game of tennis. Besides, the sun is very hot."
"You are going because I came." He spoke very quietly, and there was such a hurt note in his voice that I could not meet his eyes. "Miss Smith, there's something I want to say to you. I beg your pardon for not telling you before, I should have done so yesterday,—no, when I first spoke to you, but when you took it for granted that I was young Barford, I thought I would let you think I was, for a while, just for a joke. It was a very stupid one."
"Then you're not?" I asked slowly.
"No. I am Gilbert Spear, very much at your service."
Gilbert Spear! Arnold Spear's son, who I thought was thousands of miles away! Gilbert Spear, the man whom Daddy had chosen!
"Oh—h!" I gasped. I could feel that my face was red and little spots of light dancing before my eyes.
"What is it?" he asked in surprise at my exclamation.
"I—I hurt my finger!" I fibbed, wildly. "Something sharp in the sand—a piece of shell or glass."
"Let me see it!" he demanded.
"Oh, no! It's quite all right now." I twisted my handkerchief about my hand, and added blandly althought my heart was beating very fast "So you are Mr. Spear of Boston."
"No, New York." I breathed more freely. Evidently my ruse had succeeded and he hadn't connected my agitation with the disclosure of his identity. "And I know your name," he added, "although you haven't told me."
"I wonder if you do!" I smiled slyly to myself.
"You are Lucy," he said softly, and I stared at him in astonishment. "I heard your mother calling you last evening, after you had started for home."
So that accounted for it! He had heard Aunt Julie screaming for her maid, Lucie. An inspiration flashed through my mind. He was willing to play a joke upon me, to let me think he was Mr. Barford, when he wasn't; very well, I would turn the tables on him! I smiled, and opened my parasol again.
"I wonder how you knew!" I remarked demurely. "But that was not my mother. Mrs. Smith is my—my aunt!"
"Oh!" he said a little blankly. "And that tall, dark young man, who took the launch out this morning; is he your brother, or your cousin?"
"Neither," I replied, emphatically. "He isn't any relation at all, just a guest of Aunt Julie's. He took a friend over to the mainland, and the engine broke down on the way back. He drifted for ages before he could fix it, and Aunt Julie was dreadfully worried. She thought the launch had upset."
I scarcely realized what I was telling him. My mind was still dazed with the shock of the revelation which had come to me. It was Gilbert Spear, talking there so unconcernedly beside me!
"He broke down? Is that what he told you?"
"Why, yes. Isn't it true?" I demanded.
He paused for a moment before he replied.
"Well, if it is, the launch was caught in a very peculiar current, that's all. I happened to be cruising about in my own motor boat this morning, and I saw him land the old gentleman at the village wharf. He turned in a few minutes, and put out at the fastest clip he could go for one of the islands there to the south; I don't know just where, I didn't watch him particularly. After about an hour or so, I saw him coming back. He made a wide detour, and then headed for your cove."
I drew a deep breath.
"So he fibbed," I remarked. "I thought as much!"
"Perhaps I shouldn't have told you?" he hesitated. "You—you don't like him?"
"No, I don't," I replied frankly. "I detest him. He's perfectly horrid, but of course I can't say that to Aunt Julie."
"Does he annoy you?" demanded Gilbert Spear.
"Oh, not in that way!" I hastened to assure him, and blushed furiously the next minute. "It is just that his mere presence is distasteful to me. He is rude, sarcastic and overbearing, but I think that one of—of my cousins, is rather favorably impressed by him."
"I see. And the other young man, is he your brother?"
"No, he is a cousin. I have no one except my father, and he is away just now."
"And you're not very happy, are you? Please don't be offended, I couldn't help seeing, since we first talked together, that everything was not right with you. Look here! Are you going to forgive me for not telling you at first who I was, and let us be good friends?"
I nodded.
"Then I want to be of service to you; I want you to let me help you, if I can. If you're unhappy about anything, and you can't tell your aunt about it, will you trust me and let me know? If that Frenchman annoys you, or whatever it was that frightened you yesterday occurs again, promise me that you will tell me?"
I looked levelly into his eyes for a long minute. Yes, I could trust him! I had felt it instinctively from the first, but now I knew.
I gave him my hand, silently, and he held it for a moment in both of his. I don't know what he would have said next, but something pointed prodded my foot sharply, and I started and laughed.
Laddie had been trying to chew the buckle off my slipper, and I hadn't even noticed it.
While he wiggled about apologetically under his master's rebuke, I watched them both. Was there ever such a coincidence in the world! That it was he, of all men, whom I should meet on this lonely, remote island! Wouldn't Daddy be surprised when he found that I knew this very young man he had a sneaking desire to have me meet!—But would he? The quick thought made me cold all over. Had Daddy conspired with Arnold Spear to send that young man up there, and throw him in my way? Did he know who I really was, all the time? The coincidence seemed too suspiciously great to be true. Oh, if he had done this, I would never forgive Daddy, as long as I lived! I felt that I must know.
"How does it happen," I looked straight into his eyes again as I asked the question. "That you are here, occupying the Barford's bungalow, Mr. Spear?"
"Oh, I was in Boston, visiting the publisher chap for whom I am doing this book, and one evening I told Jimmie Barford that I wished I could find a desert island, where I could go and finish this thing in peace, and he presented me with the keys of his bungalow here and his blessing. He said that for sheer loneliness and isolation it had any desert island beaten forty ways, but I haven't found it so, although I shall not tell him of his mistake."
I was silent. My fear as to some conspiracy of Daddy's being responsible for his presence was allayed, the pure accident of our meeting was apparent, and yet a new, strange sense of shyness, of unaccountable trembling seized me. With the last words, his voice had grown softer and more low, and he stopped suddenly, as if there was something more he would have said, but checked himself.
He had been staring straight out to sea, but now he turned to me, with frank directness in his glance.
"Miss Smith, won't you ask me to call? Or rather, will you give me leave to introduce myself to your cousin—Alaric, I think you said his name was?"
"Oh, no!" I cried hastily. "I couldn't ask you to call, you know, they would want to know how I had met you and all that. It would be different if Daddy were here, he would understand, and I am quite sure he would not mind!" I dimpled in spite of myself, when I thought of what Daddy would be likely to say, and then grew grave again. Daddy was away off on the sea and I was here, in Aunt Julie's hands! "It wouldn't be of any use for you to know Alaric because I'm quite sure he wouldn't introduce you to Aunt Julie, or ask you to call. I do not think they would welcome any visitors."
He looked crestfallen and not a little mystified, and I decided impulsively to take him into my confidence.
"Mr. Spear," I said earnestly. "You asked me to trust you, and I am going to. I am not really unhappy but I'm puzzled about conditions at home. Until I came to visit Aunt Julie, I had not seen her or her family for some years. Daddy had to go away, and he thought it best for me to be here. He did not know it, but I have discovered that they are in some trouble or anxiety, which everyone, even the Frenchman, seems to share, but me. That is why I do not think they would welcome any new acquaintance just now. I should not tell you this, for it concerns neither you nor me, of course, but a great many things have occurred which mystify me; little things, which no one would consider of any account, perhaps, unless they saw or experienced them."
He seemed to be watching me curiously, and now he nodded, slowly.
"I understand," he said. "That is the reason why I have come upon you so often quite by yourself."
"Yes. I was troubled, and wanted to think things out."
"Now that we are friends, will you tell me what it was which frightened you into hysterics yesterday?" He leaned nearer.
"Oh, that was nothing but a silly fancy, as I told you," I laughed. Then a sudden thought came to me. "Mr. Spear, there was a storm the night of our arrival, if you remember."
"I heard it. It was a corker while it lasted."
"Did you hear anything else—anything strange, I mean—just before it started?"
He frowned reflectively.
"I don't think I did. Oh, yes. I remember that I thought I heard something which sounded like a shout. Is that what you mean?"
"Yes. That was one of the things I couldn't understand."
"It was probably one of the men on your yacht. It seemed to come from the direction of the cove."
"So I thought," I replied. "But something else happened a little later that night, which made me doubtful. Oh, I really can't tell you, it all seems so foolish, so absurdly fanciful here in broad daylight that I don't want to talk any more about it."
"But you have said enough to show me that you are really frightened about something!" he protested, earnestly. "I don't wish to pry into your aunt's affairs, of course, or to know anything more than you wish to tell me, but if you feel that any trouble or danger of some sort threatens you, remember I hold you to your promise to come to me."
"Oh, I will gladly." I think my face must have shown the sincerity of my words. "I am so glad you are here!"
"So am I." It wasn't much of a reply, in mere words, but his tone more than made up for its brevity. I looked away hurriedly.
"But the book will soon be finished, and then you will go away."
"I shall not go while you are here, while you may need me. Laddie and I will be at your service, always." His tone was very low again and for some reason my heart began to beat more quickly.
"You are very kind," I said. "But it may be weeks and weeks before Daddy comes to take me away."
"I shall stay." He drew in his breath sharply. "Remember please, little girl, if anything troubles you, you are to let me know; if anything frightens you, come to me. I think if you even called to me, I should hear you, at any hour, day or night."
"Thank you," my voice was almost a whisper. "I shall not forget," and he helped me to my feet.
"I—I must go," I murmured, wistfully. "I promised Aunt Julie to be home at teatime."
"And the tennis?" he smiled.
"What tennis?" I asked, blankly.
"The set you promised your cousin Alaric, don't you remember?"
"That was a fib," I confessed, dropping my eyes before his laughing ones.
"I knew it. You don't prevaricate skilfully, Lucy."
Lucy! The sound of the strange name on his lips reminded me afresh of the deception I was practising upon him, which for the moment had quite slipped my mind. The impulse came to tell him the truth, there and then, but I checked it. I wanted to keep my secret a little while longer, that his surprise would be more complete when he knew. Anyway, this was only the third time we had spoken to each other, and he had no right to call me "Lucy" if he did think it was my name.
"Perhaps I don't," I acknowledged, with a little laugh. "I haven't had a great deal of practice."
"And you are not sorry now that you did not run away when I came to-day?"
He had taken my hand, and was holding it gently, but so firmly that I could not withdraw it.
"No, I am very glad," I replied, as simply as he asked the question. "I don't feel lonely or nervous any more. Goodbye, my friend, and thank you for offering to help me."
"You will remember to call upon me, if there is need?"
"I will remember."
I left him and went up the pathway toward home with my heart just singing. I was happy for the first time in so long that I had almost forgotten what it was like. All the things which had puzzled and disturbed me, melted into utter insignificance. It wasn't only that I had found a friend, but that friend was Gilbert Spear! It seemed too wonderful to realize, even yet. Surely, it was fate which had led him to Sunset Island, the one man whom I had determined not even to meet if I could help it, and to snub unmercifully if I couldn't. And now I was counting on his friendship, depending upon it, trusting him almost as I would trust Daddy! It seemed almost incomprehensible.
The family were all gathered on the lawn waiting for tea when I approached, and Bijou glanced up and laughed shrilly.
"Heavens, you're a sight!" she cried. "Look what you are doing, Maida! You're carrying your writing case upside down, and the ink has run out all over you!"
"Your pretty dress! What a shame!" Aunt Julie supplemented. "Never mind, Lucie will get the stains out for you. But, Maida, whatever in the world has happened to the buckle on your slipper?"